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Sasha
11th January 2012, 12:38
http://tdwgeeks.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/fb838a07-d155-48d1-a2fd-a6847e8e3b85.png
Xbox 360 Plant Workers Threaten Suicide: 300 employees at a Foxconn plant in Wuhan, China, threatened to kill themselves (http://www.wantchinatimes.com/news-subclass-cnt.aspx?id=20120110000064&cid=1103) last week after the company denied them compensation they were promised.
The workers intended to jump from the top of a building at the plant, which produces Xbox 360 consoles for Microsoft, but were eventually talked down by the mayor of Wuhan.
The employees staged the suicide protest after asking for a raise and being told they could either continue work with no extra pay or quit their jobs and receive compensation. After most of them quit, the company didnt pay out the money as promised.
Xbox 360 production was temporarily suspended during the incident.
A Microsoft spokesman issued the following statement:

Microsoft takes working conditions in the factories that manufacture its products very seriously, and we are currently investigating this issue. We have a stringent Vendor Code of Conduct that spells out our expectations, and we monitor working conditions closely on an ongoing basis and address issues as they emerge. Microsoft is committed to the fair treatment and safety of workers employed by our vendors, and to ensuring conformance with Microsoft policy.
This isnt the first time Foxconn has been in the news over poor working conditions. Fourteen of the companys employees committed suicide (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foxconn_suicides) back in 2010, and an iPad 2 assembly line exploded last year, killing two (http://geeks.thedailywh.at/2011/05/20/foxconn-plant-explosion-of-the-day/).
[kotaku (http://kotaku.com/5874706/report-mass-suicide-threats-at-xbox-360-plant)]

00000000000
11th January 2012, 12:48
"..takes working conditions in the factories that manufacture its products very seriously.."
This line is used so often and it means nothing. After every 'scandal' involving any corporation or organisation, you get a hastily drafted statement that will contain 'very seriously' and/or 'we will thoroughly investigate any allegations'.

Cheung Mo
11th January 2012, 19:58
A shame the traitors in Beijing who let this shit go on were not gunned down painfully by the real Red Army.

sulla
11th January 2012, 20:01
I think the workers should throw Microsoft CEO's off the roof instead!

Drosophila
11th January 2012, 20:11
You can't put restrictions on the free market! After all they don't have to work there, right?

Aleenik
11th January 2012, 21:13
A shame the traitors in Beijing who let this shit go on were not gunned down painfully by the real Red Army."Real Red Army"?

Lol. An army that used many horrible methods to carry out a 'Communist revolution'. F Mao.

Welshy
11th January 2012, 22:12
On reddit someone posted a list of companies that Foxconn supplies for and it ended up being pretty much every company involving computers, video games, cell phones and etc. And you could see the gears starting to grind and their heads begin to smoke when they began to realize that the whole voting with your wallet won't do shit.

Comrade Samuel
11th January 2012, 22:31
Glad to see the whole free market deal is working out for you china.

Misanthrope
12th January 2012, 00:31
Fuck anyone who denies the existence of wage slavery. A form of labor which drives one to suicide is barbarism.

cenv
12th January 2012, 01:12
From the CNN article (http://www.cnn.com/2012/01/11/world/asia/china-microsoft-factory/index.html?hpt=hp_t3) on this:


After the 2010 suicides at Foxconn, the company said it was taking measures to improve workers' lives, including organizing recreational activities, calling in Buddhist monks to offer spiritual consolation and setting up a 24-hour help line.

Yeah, obviously what these workers need is spiritual consolation.

Why didn't we think of that? So much easier than the whole revolution thing.